Jamie McCombe puts difficult time behind him at Bristol City

Bristol City (0) 1 Norwich City (0) 0

By Trevor Haylett

6:03PM BST 19 Oct 2008

Jamie McCombe had barely noticed the swirl of controversy hanging over Norwich last week as he focused on his return for Bristol City and the chance to put a testing time both on and off the pitch firmly behind him.

His late winner suggested a welcome change of fortune for the big defender following a tale of woe that began at the start of the season when his grandfather, David, a huge influence on his career, died. On the second weekend of the campaign he suffered a serious injury against Derby in which his cheekbone was fractured in four places. A long and painful recovery came as his girlfriend was grieving over the loss of her mother.

"It's the worst injury I've suffered and it's nice to be back, " said McCombe. "When I was in hospital they had to prop me up to sleep and then woke me every hour to make sure blood wasn't seeping into my eye. The first two weeks rehabilitation were not nice but luckily the Olympics were on and I could watch that. " Quite how Norwich allowed him to flick home Jamie McAllister's long free-kick unchallenged is symbolic of their travails. They created chances before slumping to a third straight defeat and the last thing they need is for the FA investigation into the home game with Derby and unusual Far East betting patterns to drag on.

Manager Glenn Roeder insists his club are innocent and added: "The actual thought of something like that going on is completely disgusting. At the same time I am not that naive to not know that where there is the potential to make money, evil people will be swilling around at the bottom of the barrel."

Lee praised

Goalkeeper Richard Lee earned the praise of his manager, Aidy Boothroyd, after saving two first-half penalties to help Watford towards their first away win of the season, 3-0, at Southampton.

Lee brought down David McGoldrick but saved from the same player and also kept out Paul Wotton’s spot kick.